Lynda Robinson - Drinker Of Blood

Planting his hands on the ground beside pharaoh's head, Meren lifted his upper body. Pain arced through him, and his left arm collapsed. The chaos above him descended and wrought havoc with his senses. He seemed to be living just outside his body.

With vague surprise he looked on as Horemheb pulled him off the king and laid him on his back. Tutankhamun rolled over, crouched beside him. Pharaoh's mouth moved, but the sound of his words seemed delayed. Meren was even more astonished when the king bent and gripped something sticking out of the ground close to Meren.

When Tutankhamun broke the end of an arrow, the agony that resulted told Meren that the missile was buried in his side, not the ground. Meren searched for the wound and clamped his hand over the point of entry. Horemheb was still beside him while the king propped Meren's head on one leg.

"What are you doing here?" Meren snapped at the general. "Find the bowman."

"Every man I have is chasing him and Mose, including your son and your cousin and your charioteers. Don't tell me how to hunt criminals, Meren. I found you, didn't I?"

"You let Mose get away?"

"Damn you, Meren. The men closest to the king were trying to protect him from the bowman, and the ones farther away didn't know Mose was a criminal."

"My apologies, old friend," Meren said.

Grimacing, he looked around at the wall of men surrounding pharaoh, then up at the king. Tutankhamun was regarding him with a mixture of anxiety and relief.

"It wasn't necessary to prove your innocence in so dramatic a manner," the king said. He placed his hand over Meren's bloody one. "I already believed you."

Meren smiled, but his lips contorted with pain. "My heart exults in thy majesty's safekeeping."

Pharaoh said something in reply, but to Meren the king seemed to recede into the distance. He blinked, which was a mistake, because he found he couldn't lift his eyelids. The noise and confusion returned, grew louder, and then faded into a whirlpool of blackness.

Horizon of the Aten, the independent reign of the pharaoh Akhenaten

Nefertiti watched Akhenaten stalk along the edge of the reflection pool at the riverside palace. In spite of the heat, he wore a cloak over his robe and paused often to lift his face to the sun. His gold leather sandals sent pebbles flying into the water as he scuffed along. Finally he returned to the shade of the acacia tree beneath which Nefertiti's chair rested and stood before her.

"I no longer remember how many times we've argued about this, beautiful one. I'm weary beyond enduring, and your discontent grieves me."

"I've always told you the truth, husband. The army grows restless with the Hittite jackal prowling the borders of the empire."

"And I repeat-the Asiatics live in chaos. It is their normal state. Once Mitanni held sway; now the Hittites dominate. One day the Assyrians may claim that right. Such internecine squabbling means little to Egypt, as long as our trade routes remain safe."

Nefertiti rose and put her hand on Akhenaten's arm. "And how long will they remain safe, husband, if the Hittites come to think Egypt is soft?"

"Fighting unnecessary battles wastes the blood of my people and displeases the Aten," Akhenaten said as he patted her hand.

Moving closer, Nefertiti looked into her husband's obsidian eyes and made her voice low and rough. "My love, is it not better to fight a few small battles to warn the Hittites than to allow them to mistake Egypt's resolve? If they become stronger and thus overconfident, it's certain that we'll have to spill much more blood later than if we push them back now."

"Hmm. Perhaps, beautiful one, perhaps."

Nefertiti watched her husband's interest fade. It was becoming more and more difficult to get him to attend to foreign business. He was engaged in some inner struggle having to do with the Aten. That much she knew. But the nature of the struggle and what it meant for Egypt was still a mystery to her.

Akhenaten was smiling at her. Drawing her along with him, he strolled beside the reflection pool. Slaves scurried up to ply fans above their heads.

"I'm so fortunate to have my beautiful one as great royal wife," Akhenaten said. "You relieve me of many burdens, my love, and free me for more important work with my father the Aten. Because of your help, I'm beginning to receive complete Maat-divine truth-from the sun disk. Soon all of Egypt will live in truth."

Nefertiti stopped and turned to look at him. "But the- the difficulties with some continue."

The black fire of his convictions flared in Akhenaten's eyes and then vanished with frightening abruptness.

"Fear not, my love. All will be resolved in time." He smiled and began walking again. "Let us not speak of such unpleasant things. You're going to your sister again. I don't like it, these visits to the city of the false king of the gods."

Akhenaten directed a sideways glance at her, but Nefertiti only gave him a smile of amusement.

"The temple is closed, the priests dispersed or dead, and Amun is gone. Otherwise I wouldn't go to Thebes, even to visit my dear sister."

Kissing her cheek, Akhenaten said, "It is a great comfort to know that you live in truth as I do, my beautiful one. I don't know what I would do if that weren't so."

Court business delayed Nefertiti's journey to Thebes for a few days. As the stubble in the fields shriveled under the heat of the Aten, so her ka withered in ever-present grief for her children. While she struggled in silence, the court adapted itself to Akhenaten's growing preoccupation with the Aten's revelations. An easy task, for all that the living god desired instantly came to be.

She sent Ay to the hidden messenger chosen by Shedamun with instructions and embarked at last for Thebes. The days sailing upstream should have been peaceful. They would have been if not for the nightmare. Always the dream began by the river's edge.

Clad in a shift, she scooped mud from the river bottom and mixed it with straw. When she had a mound of the ooze prepared, she picked up a bucket and poured the mud into wooden molds to make bricks that would dry in the sun on the bank. She worked in the heat until she had seven rows of bricks that stretched along the bank as far as she could see.

She was kneeling over her latest effort when Akhenaten appeared from the sky. Pharaoh landed in the middle of her bricks, squashing them to shapelessness, and strode toward her. As her husband trampled the neat squares, she protested, but Akhenaten only smiled and kept walking until he stood over Nefertiti.

Wearing his double crown, Akhenaten was naked and carried his golden crook and flail. Pharaoh planted his feet apart, right in the middle of two of Nefertiti's best bricks.

"Beautiful one, this work isn't important. Pleasing me is important."

While Nefertiti crouched before him, Akhenaten laughed. The king discarded his scepters and began to grow. His body stretched until it was the size of one of his colossi, and then it started to grow breasts in imitation of the stone image. The hips widened, and Nefertiti stared in horror. Akhenaten bent down from his great height, picked her up, and tore her shift.

Fortunately, her favorite maid slept in her cabin on the royal yacht. When Nefertiti woke sweating and disturbed, she had company. The next evening at sunset she was on deck, craning her neck for the first sight of the temples of Amun. For as long as she could remember, the gold-tipped flagstaffs with their scarlet banners meant homecoming. Impatient, she dragged a stool to the railing. She stood on it to watch the setting sun illuminate the stone and bricks of the houses and temples of Thebes. One of her ladies came to stand beside her.

Nefertiti pointed in the direction of the Amun temple and its surrounding structures. "We're almost there." As they sailed closer, she nearly betrayed herself with an exclamation. Even from the river she could see that only one flagstaff remained, its banner shredded and limp.